


Dance with the Shinigami

by SilverGopher



Category: Naruto
Genre: Gen, Its dead, OC has many sharp things, Pack Instincts, anothers inside, but this works save file was corrupted, hey so putting this here as an official warning, learning to be humanish, making deals with death, no beta we die like shinobi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-12
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-08 06:41:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 14,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26967652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverGopher/pseuds/SilverGopher
Summary: When a broken weapon makes a deal with the Shinigami, the world tilts off its axis, and things change.OC-insert, 2nd shinobi war-onwards.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 22





	1. A War-Dog dies

Chapter 1- a war dog dies

There is something broken in me, a jagged blade sharp glass-thing that was carefully crafted by my father and honed by my drill sergeants, and my specialist instructors. In the normal course of things the recruiting officer would have looked in my eyes, seen that dark thing and denied my application. But this wasn't the normal course of things, hadn't been for a while. Its not everyday that the third world war starts in your own backyard after all. I was drafted after Canada got invaded, and my hand-eye coordination and the dark thing that made me demand perfection from my tools meant I was chosen as a specialist. And since the army had quite a few of everything I wanted to be spec ops. But spec ops was filled up, nothing there for me until I had prior training. They bounced me from program to program early, but settled me in the snipers school.

I learnt stillness, how to just, fade into nothingness in the perception of others even in a quiet room, how to walk with silent steps and leave no trail. How to calculate wind and angles in my mind on the fly and to do it instinctively. They said I had a knack for it, that sniping at long range was more applied mathematics than skill. But I had both. And when they shipped me out it was as sniper support for a army vanguard pushing into eastern Europe. I was there for five years, and it was thick fighting. I killed near everyday, its so easy to kill when you've been taught since early childhood how to do it, but more than that more than then pink mist that meant id done my job , I grew.... fond of my war dogs. For that's what we were.

No vanguard is entirely sane, and all of us were broken things by the end of the first year. All jagged edges and barred teeth. All of us were destined for black ops suicide missions when the war was won. Some of us collected trophies from our kills, some took too much pleasure in it. As for me? It was as mechanical as breathing. No grand joy or impenetrable sorrow, I was a hunter, and I enjoyed the hunt but the moment of victory always left me empty. The pink mist never, never filled that hunger in me, that dark thing. And so I did my job, after all my dad had told me with all the weight and grace of a prophet handing down the words of god himself,” you will be an exemplary soldier or you will be nothing at all.” He was not a good man, my father, but I was not a good woman. I think that if I had been born one, maybe he wouldn't have raised me the way he did, he was so traditional. I hated that about him, but now looking back on it, I can see it was the grasping for safety of a man who knows he's created a great evil.

I genuinely cared for the war dogs. But there were two I cared about more than most johnny, my spotter a tall man with a Mohawk he dyed red. The regulations went out the window in a vanguard unit like ours, and he abused the shit out of that. He never wore his jacket, dyed his hair and bartered for secrets using cigarettes. One time I even helped him steal the quartermasters cig rations for a cut of them. The other was Janice, and I think I might have been the closest I was capable of being at that point to loving her. Janice was my gun jockey, and my rear guard. Her role was well, carrying my spare rifle, reloading my primary one and carrying the lmg for if things went straight to the 7th circle. She was a short stocky woman who wore her hair in a prim and proper bun, a dirty blonde who had what was actually looking back on it a rather serious drinking problem. When we weren't doing our jobs we watched old anime together and drank and smoke and talked about shit that never mattered and we didn't care about. It made us feel more like the humans they used to be, and I was learning to be.

The thing about war, and orders, and the nature of man is that it sucks, most of the time, and is terrifying some of the time, and fun the rest of the time. And all that changes is the numbers really?

I had received my final orders, not that I knew that then. The war had taken a turn on us, and it wasn't a good one. The war dogs and I had been battered hard by enemy counter offensives and it wasn't. It just, wasn't viable for the army to stay in such an exposed position. So they left us, like the bastards command always is ,and we held the line. Valiance, to do or die. Expedient. But a waste the war dogs would have been useful post war for deniable massacres and suicide runs. I knew this, Janice knew this. Johnny didn't, but johnny was kind of a dumb ass.

But so there we were in the rubble of a brownout city, smeared with dust and blood and the taste of Janice lips on my own as we laid down an veritable wall of fire. The war-dogs held one block in the face of the enemy. The other vanguard units slated for decommissioning held the rest. They would falter, but we wouldn't. We never did. I think, that everyone who wasn't a marksman had been issued an lmg and an ar, maybe even an smg for when things got too close, but I was a sniper, so there I was buried under rubble, looking down the iron sights of my rifle, pulling the trigger like a typist at their keyboard, a small mountain of spent casings around me.

And the thing my mind kept circling g back was to the kiss. Janice died. We were all going to die. But Janice died first, from what I could see, rocket hit us, rubble crushed her legs and she pulled me into the kiss as I began to panic, she tastes of ash and blood and strawberry lip-gloss. Told me she loved me as much as she could, coughed up blood and asked johnny to put her down. It would be more humane that way. Johnny did what she asked. And it was the loudest gunshot i've ever heard. I think... I think it might have been the only one that mattered to me.

But then we were back to our task, and I used my scope at first, until the rubble dust from explosions around us clogged it too much to see, even my glasses were nearly beyond repair, so I just. Detached the scope and went back to killing. I was less accurate then of course so I aimed for the body. I left a field of corpses behind me, it was... what Janice would have wanted. Probably. When the gunfire from our building started dying off, or changed from heavy rifle rounds to the chiter-chatter of smg's I knew things were.... done. I was welcoming it then I think.

My unit would go down in history I knew, winners or losers. No one forgets the war dogs, they just hide us in upper level history classes or bury us in books. Never forgotten just buried. There I was, leaning against the wall on my floor, one of my legs crushed by rubble, cigarette dangling from my lips and mingling with the taste of strawberries and blood and I didn't cry. I wasn't capable of it, then at least. Nowadays i'm not so sure. I pulled my pistol, it was, a gun I had always hated. Getting certified in it was a pain. The ergonomics were all wrong, but it had a fifteen round mag, and as long as my enemies weren't wearing body armor I should be fine. I waited what felt like an eternity but it was just... probably only fourteen or fifteen minutes. They must have been doing arrests then, of the survivors anyway, the fact that the building was still upright astounded me. There were entire portions of the building just carved out by rocket fire. Wish we had some of those, would have been an interesting light show. But.... we didn't. No use for might have beens. When they finally stepped trough the door and fanned out they were wearing ballistic vests, low grade, but enough to stop my pistols rounds. The leader, marked by a green armband on his black uniform, stepped forwards and honestly shocked me.

“Lt. Bell, so called wolf of the battlefield, you are being taken as a prisoner of war. Do you have anything to say in your defense?”

“yeah. Fuck you.” and then I pulled the trigger as fast as I could. The gun bucked in my hand, like an unruly mule. The world slowed down to nothingness as they aimed and opened fire and the bullets lit into me. It hurt, but as my cig fell out of my mouth and my vision went dark.... I smiled. I went out sharking.


	2. Dancing in the Last Garden

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A deal is struck, terms are set, and things begin to begin

for some reason I expected what came after death to be nothing but blank darkness, an eternal void. Instead when I found my eyes able to open, a blood red moon hanging low in the sky, almost obscured by Grey clouds, casting its sickly-not-right-light over a well tended garden. Roses red as blood, and red spider lilies intermingled in a chaotic garden that felt almost peaceful even if it carried a sense of unease. I found myself walking down a sandy path, cleared trough the garden by near a thousand footfalls. Traditional Japanese music played from somewhere in the background, omnipresent and relentless. What should have been potentially calming felt like the prelude to some unknowable horror. The trees almost seemed to close in, but I mustered my courage, and walked forwards into eternity.

Or... it should have been at least. There was a clearing in the garden with a low table, surrounded by cushions, and adorned with a teapot and two cups. Sitting on the other side of the table from where I entered was the scariest thing I've ever seen. If it stood it likely would have been at least eight feet tall, with a mouth with tusks and fangs, and a spiked mane of bleached-bone-white hair, and two red horns red as blood-death-ending. Its pitch black endless-void eyes stared at me. And the things mouth contorted into a smile, it swept out one hand and gestured to the other cushion so I sat down, and waited. The thing, the ending-that-comes-to-all-made-flesh, the truth, the final logic it opened my eyes to be in its mere presence. As it shifted its kimono slipped, just a bit revealing emaciated skin, and ribs-too many ribs. I couldn't count them. This thing, this weight of it all, I found it fascinating. The silence loomed above us and below us like the walkways to a gallows and finally, because this was the only truly patient thing in the world my snipers patience broke first. It must have been hours though, so I kept my pride.

“the music is nice, though I prefer Mozart myself. Well, no that's actually a lie, and I honestly prefer Wagner but I thought Mozart sounded better to say as an opener and oh my god I can't lie here can I?”

that made the-end-of-all chuckle. It was a sound like grinding boulders, and I shivered.

“no, you cannot lie here, or present any misdirection, for I am the final truth and all truths are laid bare before me. You are here to be judged, and weighed and found a place.” it turned those wonderful-awful-eyes upon me, and in a soft voice that was like silk over a blade,

“perhaps a different form would set you better at ease? It is an important part of what comes next that we be as close to equals as we are possible of being for this to proceed smoothly.” and then like ripples on a still pond, the flesh of it began to change, and morph until I sat across from a twenty year old woman, who looked fresh from drama class, dark makeup- artfully applied kohl and dark clothes over mesh. It-she-she yes, I would use she now it simplified things in my mind, made it easier to quantify.

She continued in the silk-blade voice,

“would you mind if we danced while we talked? I think you would find the irony amusing, and it has been so long since anyone took me up on the offer.”

“I would be delighted too, I only know how to waltz though I hope that's fine.”

“Waltzing is fine.”

and then we were dancing, moving trough the back and forth side-walk and the spins, as death with a capital D finally cut to the heart of the matter.

“if you were being judged on morals, or on societal conceptions then you would most certainly be consigned to hell. The thing is you never learnt those. They don't bind you, and I find myself very much desirous of someone like you. You see, your one of my favored types of people. The hunters, the broken-glass people as you call it. Oh, if I do what im thinking of you'll never really learn how to be a proper person, certainly not by the standards of your last society. But you'll learn how to be something that could be mistaken for one. Perhaps.”

“and what is it you want to do? I'm very curious and I, oh god im being rude im so sorry I....”

“its quite fine, now what I want to do is make a contract. I over see all realities, natural, fictional, splinter and stock. i want to send you to one of my favored ones, I believe you've seen it? A world where ninja's breathe fire and death comes in many forms. You see, I find myself somewhat upset about how things go on in that little story of which you have heard, its all too childish. But by making a contract, the rules change, and and that world becomes real. And I like that, I prefer overseeing real worlds.”

She spun me into an arch as I blurted out the question that was burning in my mind,

“you want to send me to naruto??i.. why??”

“becuase I want an agent, if you do well there I will send you out further and further afield. this is not to say that you will never get to rest, but I find your kind enjoy this sort of work. You see, I want you to be well, a vision of me. There are certain things that will happen of course. Your new body will be the last body you get, it will stop aging somewhere around twenty, its always a bit up in the air. And you wont stay dead, you'll just have a nice sit down with me and we'll talk before you go back. And after your first death im afraid that the body will change.”

“Change? Change how, that worries me...”, and it relly did a bone deep worry. the body you have is a defining feature of an existence, and i had spent a lot of time turning my previous now body into something i could call mine.

“you remember the edo-tensai of course? That is how you will appear post death, and while I will not impose the restriction of that upoun you, I am unable to alter the rules of the universe beyond its realtive level of reality.”

“oh... I, I accept.”

“good then I will give you your first task, make a name for yourself in the second shinobi world war. And if possible keep sakumo out of my clutches for at least a while longer.”

“what are my responsibilities beyond this task?” there was always something, and i wasnt dissapointed in its revelation.

“What does any emissary of death do? Kill people, of course. Win wars. Learn how to be something more than a pure tool, I would like to be able to have a solid conversation with you.”

and then the music stopped and the moon hung low-low-low, and everything swirled into blackness.


	3. Rebirth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> very early childhood, learning instincts and a new sibling

The blackness was warm, and pulsed in time with my heart. Badump-badump, and there was something in here with me. I wasn't sure how I felt about that, in fact I was pretty sure it was...bad actually? Being alone in a strange darkness is bad but not being alone is worse. I will admit that the stress of that almost made it possible to ignore the buzzing inside my soul a burning thing made of static and fire. It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize that I was in the process of being born. Or, kind of? It was definitely somewhere in the process, which meant that the other thing here in the dark with me is my twin.... I hope I don't eat him. I think id would like to have a sibling.

I had a lot of time to think, and a lot of new thoughts and for lack of a better word instincts. I knew that my twin would be the most important in the world. That I was going to be first, it was write in our buzzing. I thought a lot about what I knew about morality. Is it correct to kill on orders, but not to do it for personal reasons? That's what I was told growing up , so It was probably true. But my previous father often lied. I knew I wasn't a good person but I think I could be a great one. After all one persons great man is another's monster. And I was very good at being a monster.

When I was squeezed into the world it was a painful miserable process that took hours. I came first and I came screaming and crying. I was a baby after all, there was no dignity to lose. I stared at these blurry people, and as I tried to figure out which ones were my parents, I was handed to a man with silver hair, and my brain screamed that he was safe-pack-alpha-yes, an endless loop that startled me into crying, again which was rather embarrassing. He looked at me and grumbled in a language I could understand, thank you death, “hush now girl, its safe.” and his voice was warm-good-alpha and I believed him. I believed a father for the first time, as it turns out it would'nt be the last time. How strange.

I think I went to sleep then, and woke up in a blurry room, that was grey-safe-den-home, next to my brother. He was pack-safe-protect, and I agreed with my instincts. My vision might have been bad, but I could see him a soft ball of uncoordinated limbs and fat and silver hair. I went back to sleep. That's how I spent a number of years, sleeping, and learning how to talk and walk and play like a child from my kaa-san. Though her attempts to get me to play amounted to mostly putting me down next to sakumo, because yes my twin was hatake sakumo, the man who would start the third great shinobi war as a catspaw for danzo and who death had charged me with protecting if possible. Not that I needed the push, he was pack after all. Tou-san had sat me down and explained things after I had made a sound halfway between a snarl and a bark when a friend of his visited the compound univited. I thought he was foe-interloper-blood-fire, but tou-san explained that sometimes pack could be people you worked closely with not just family. I had sat there in stunned silence as I tried to correct my thoughts on him to pack-blood-fire. It took a while and tou-san just sat there and watched me do it, smiling a little with the fanged hatake smile when I got it right.

“you see pup, that we hatake are wolves, and wolves have packs. This is good and true, but sometimes pack changes. New wolves join, and old ones leave. Sometimes pack dies, or sometimes pack betrays you. But you always have a pack.” the wisedome there blew my little two year old mind.

“hai tou-san,” I eventually managed to fumble out.

My father was a traditional man, in all the best ways, he ran me, as his heir trough the early hatake drills. I ran in the woods with his wolves to learn to run, and track with the nose that smelled truth and lies, and blood and life, and it was way more fun than playing with blocks. we did hand-sign drills, and early stretching katas to get my body used to vigorous movement. It was fascinating, and sakumo was a genuine genius, there right alongside me. But I wouldnt get the specialized training until I was old enough and strong enough to hold a weapon properly. Which was fair.

“remeber pups, that you will be learning different things. Ren-chan, you are slated to be a weapons master, and a frontline shinobi. We are in the shadow of a war, and its likely you will fight at least one in your lifetime. Sakumo, the only skills I can truly pss you are my skills with weapons, but you are to be a tracking specialist, and a potiental frontline shinobi. It will depend on your aptitude. When you make chunin you can learn other skills, but from me you will learn to fight like a hatake, like a shinobi-samurai. I might even teach you jutsu if you have the knack for it.”

He started getting us to slowly expand our chakra by the devious means of studying for yin and exercise for yang. He told us there were more advanced ways to expand your reserves but that we weren't ready yet. It was a thing to do in early adolescence. Doing it too early risked death via chakra exhaustion.

I didnt want to die yet, I liked my face... probably. There were no mirrors in the compound, they were expensive and the village was only around fifteen years old.

I thought somewhat frequently about my war-dogs, and where they had ended up. That war had surely warped their souls beyond reckoning. It made me a little bitter that I had gotten this chance and not Janice.

I spent a lot of time with wolves, but perhaps even more in the unlocked armory staring at the hatake clan warplate. It was a strange thing, a full dou cuirass on its backing vest, with an attached fur mantle, and the hatake mon engraved on the front. It was near the gorget-piece, because there was one of those. I genuinely fell in love with it. There were other pieces but it was clear that the dou was the only piece that was uniform. Arrayed around what I could only assume was my fathers armor, were a selection of blades, three of them to be sure. The white bladed tanto, that was too long to be a tanto, and was essentially a shortsword that sakumo would become famous for, a wakizashi of the same white steel and a katana.

“I see you've been in here quite a while. You do know your training will start when you turn three right? You'll have plenty of time to play with blades.”

I jumped, im not ashamed to say, even though I was a still and quiet child my silent footsteps were nothing compared to my fathers.

“i-i was wondering when I would get my own armor? It, I really like it.”

“when you reach chunin or war breaks out, whichever happens first.”


	4. Family training

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> learning the ropes,second war era families don't mess around with training

the thing about having a pack-brother-blood, was that I felt an intense need to be around him. We were inseparable. And this was strange to me somewhere in the back of my head. But he was pack, and pack sticks together. So we learnt together. We played games of ninja, a sort of hid and seek and throwing game, we followed tou-san and practiced the cats foot technique. It was fun to sneak, and the creaky floors gave us trouble at first. We were what most would consider prodigies. Sakumo was an energetic young boy and I... wasn't. I mean, rather obviously I was a daughter but... I had stillness trained into me. I only moved when neccesary or with deliberate intensity. I was far more comfortable standing slightly behind him as he ran back and force across the room, then I would ever be as the center of attention I think. But then that was fine, tou-san had told me my role anyway. “ your the first born ren, so you'll be the weapons master, and I know you'll do me proud. Any other talents you find, you tell me first okay? And we'll train you up the hatake way.” and a weapons master may be one of the deadliest nin on the battlefield but that didn't mean they were the center of attention. No that was and would always be the ninjutsu users.

Learning stretches and finger dexterity alongside my brother was... interesting. I understood the importance of such things so even when holding the hand-signs felt wrong or bad I practiced. And morning stretches were a weird cross between yoga, slowly increasing in difficulty weekly, and the very first beginnings of a martial art. Tou-san told us, as alpha of the pack, that first we would learn taijutsu. For despite our upcoming specialties at some point we would our blades would shatter, our kunai would dwindle, our chakra would empty, but we would always always have tai-jutsu. So we drilled. We drilled every morning for hours. Strike, block, counterstrike. Kicks and punches, and movement in a three directional environment. After taijutsu and conditioning was done, then we'd get to play with the toys. Kunai and shuriken and senbon first. They were the staple weapons of every ninja, just as taijutsu was the staple art. It was fundamental in a way other tools weren't. A ninja was considered proficent went they could hit a target seven times out of ten while moving. Prodigious if they could do it ten out of ten while the target was also moving. I practiced well into the night at movement drills and stationary. My role was set after all. though sakumo and I didnt interact much during training hours, beyond strike-parry-return, out tou-san believed in sweat and blood and hard work trumping talent, and while he was glad we had both he was determined that if we had time to talk we had time to train harder, I made a habit of climbing up next to him on the futon in our den, and just humming to him as I feel into the light doze-sleep that ninja use habitually. Every soldier learns it eventually, I just figured it out in my last life. Our pack-bond was still strong, to be sure, but our friendship suffered and I was so used to being as close as it was possible for me to be with a sibling. Idly I wondered if he would ever drunkenly cry over my shoulder about the weight of expectations and the world at large. He didn't seem the type but then my last brother hadn't either. I don't know why that thought comforted me. Perhaps that it meant we'd be closer than we'd become. Maybe we would be battle partners? I could only hope.

I was four when my nearly prodigious accuracy with kunai and shuriken and senbon, part inborn talent , part relentless training was deemed up to par for my slated role, and then that's when tou-san handed me a tanto, one of the ones that was stretching the definition of a tanto, being exactly as long as it was allowed to be , more a short sword than a dagger, and told me,

“hatakes train with live blades, though dull so that there is no period to wait trough to know a weapons weight. I will teach you every weapon I know how to use and the hatake katas, and we'll find what fits you best alright?”

“hai” I answered, with what I was almost sure were stars in my eyes, as he took out the tanto from the armory. Bone white, and thrumming with power, and pressed it into my hand, and I knew IT in an instinctual way. Tou-san looked at me, at my sharp-edged smile where that dead thing in me tried to leak trough and he smiled a wolves-'s smile.

“all hatake blades are made this way. Our chakra is white, and electric in a way others aren't. And so when we forge our blades, we press our chakra into them as we do it. This is how you make a chakra blade. But ours, it changes them. Other chakra blades don't change color, but the sheer weight and power we press into it, alters it fundamentally. Other weapons shatter under the weight of our chakra but not a white-light blade. This is one of mine, I forged a full blade-set, and when you forge your own weapons they will be attuned to you in a way no other blades ever will be. If it shatters, which is unlikely under all but the very greatest of stresses, then you will need to forge a new one.”

the idea of a blade-that-was-me appealed to me on a visceral level. The best tools became part of you. To get that as a , initial design ? It was a dream. Must be.

“you will train with mine, because our chakra is similar. It will give you what you need to learn to channel chakra into your blade. When you go to the academy, you will carry a standard issue tanto, in whichever configuration you prefer to wear, and you will continue to learn weapons skills here after academy hours have ended. When you graduate, we will forge you your first weapon.”

“h-hai.....thank you so much,!!” mindful of the blade in my hand I hugged him. I think that shocked him. I was a taciturn little child, but that. That was in retrospect the first time I had hugged anyone in this life. And I did it after being told I could have a weapon....im lucky this is a ninja family or tou-san would be very worried.

The hatake katas, known as the fangs were focused on ruthless precision, every movement designed to strike a kill spot either organ, vein, or nerves. In my past life I was a fan of such precision, made my entire life and career off it, and so I practiced the tanto katas several times daily, until they were muscle memmory, helped by my near eidatic memory, a gift most ninja clans share through selective breeding I found out. The tanto was the defualt backup weapon of ninja in this time period. It was tuaght in the academy even. It was on the list of school supplies. Later on of course ninja attitudes would change, and the world would focus more on high impact ninjutsu as a specialty for near everyone, and taijutsu as the new best backup. I think I loved the tanto. Intially the idea of being a individual who specialized in close range combat worried me. In my past life I had been well, a ranged fighter. A far-range fighter. But I, genuinely enjoyed the movement, the aggression, the kill-bleed-protect of my instincts screaming in a fight.

When I was four father handed me a wakizashi, told me this was the next step in swords, and then we practiced more, at first it was hard to adjust to having the extra reach but it was a quick adjustment, and I was expected to master this too, and so I did. Father expected only what I could deliver after all and I dearly loved him, more so than my ] mother and so I did what my doomed father wanted before all.

The thing about the wakizashi I found, was that I kind of hated it.with a passion. It was too long for a knife fighters instincts, which had been honed this entire childhood, and two short for proper sword fighting. I learnt it all the same but I don't think I would ever forge one.

heres the thing about being a shinobi. It happens in stages. Training starts always with flexibility and endurance and taijutsu. The bedrock that you can always rely upoun. Then weaponry, for safety at home as most ninja parents leave their weapons out and about, and for usage. They are the tools of the trade afterall. But chakra. Chakra comes later. At the time I was born into, before the death of tobirama, before tsunade senju would revolutionize medicine. There were things which were common knowledge which would be disproven later, such as that it was safe for a child under eight to play with chakra. Using chakra too early leads to a shorter lifespan, never in a way that'd be noticeable to a nin, but to a civilian lifespan. Your're looking at a death in the late 60s most likely. Which is twenty years younger than it takes to be considered an elder. But a nins life is measured in a single decade. If they last longer then they are the exception not the rule. So we didnt learn to manipulate chakra until we were five. Too young by later standards, but too old by our own. Other prodigy children were being trained in offensive jutsu by this point. Formal customs as well. The hatake didnt really have formalized customs. We had knowledge. We had secrets and techniques and parthners. But customs were for more “civilized clans”. Well we had customs, the age of inheritance. The various things which were called the fangs. There were so many things called fangs. But the thing that stood out to me the most as a custom I would have to pass on would be the meeting with the dame. But thats for another time. Without having the solid fundamentals required for offensive jutsu, and a limited clan repetoire, we learnt the leaf exercise for fine control and the channeling exercise for combat control. I preferred to channel my chakra through a blade, and it was good pratice for using it offensively like that. Once we had shown ourselves to be up to par with tou-sans exacting gaze, he started us walking on walls, and trees, and that was....exhilirating. The options of attack and defense that opened up churned in my mind. Thats when tou-san had us start sparring while on walls, to get used to three directional combat. It strained our reseves to the point of exhuastion every day. And thus a twofold purpose was achieved.... we went to bed easily and our reserves started to expand.something we would thank him for before the end.

At five we worked on katanna's, and I found I liked theese most of the swords we had done by now, still snappy, and precise the way I liked and utterly lethal, the katas adjusted for reach and speed but the fang stayed the same for all swords, and really it was more about adapting the blade to the style than adapting the style to the blade which is not how most clans do it I heard. I started wearing my katanna across my back, the only way to carry it with my small size, even around the village. To be visibly armed is almost comforting to a nin. They dont worry overly much about the weapons you display, it helps the mcategorize how best to kill you after all. Its the weapons you hide they worry about. Five is also when I enterred the academy, and dads infrequent missions became more frequent.


	5. Academy days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Academies, Hokages, Contracts, and a new toy

konoha is strange to think about, if im being honest. It is two hundred miles of city enclosed by reinforced walls, surrounded by another hundred miles of assorted farmlad, deep in the heart of an impenetrable forest. It has been said, even after just ten years of our existence, that to enter the forests where konoha dwells is to enter death. Like the waters of mizu, or the deserts of suna. Some enviorments just mean certain things. Konohas streets were designed for war. They are small, narrow things made for ambushes and traps, winding and cross secting and confusing. To learn to navigate konoha is one of the first true lessons every nin learns. Civilians budget extra time to reach their destinations, but nin are expected to be prompt when reporting to lord tobirama, the honorable second. I know that his reign will not last much longer, he dies in the middle of the second war, though I am not sure how long that war is. He's a warforged blade and if there is ever to be true hope for peace then he must die. I will do everything in my power to preserve him. I like him in a way I have never liked a single authority before him. He built this city on blood sweat and beucracy.

The academy is at the base of the hokage tower, so that the most powerful nin can protect the weakest. And I think that I can respect that. Sometimes in this life I have wondered if I would not have been better born in mist, where even now we can hear the whispers of chigiri, of bloodsoaked rice paddies and exams of steel-death-betrayal.

Heres a thing. I had always liked tobirama from my last life to this one. I saw myself in him, not him now as a powerful beuracrat, but, the tobirama who cut down uchiha by the score for orders he couldnt really understand? That tobirama who grew and became something more? I think I respected him even more than either of my fathers. He attended our first day of academy actually. He gave a speech, and at the end he mingled briefly. It was clear he wasnt entirely comfortable with the children, especially out-clan children. But he put in the effort which I respected a lot. When he came to me, he asked me a single question ,and it has stuck with me to this day. “why do you want to be a ninja little one?”

five might be the entry age for the academy but it is the youngest possible age. Most students are enrolled at five, with years more clan training. I thought about it, and something in his gaze hardened as he saw it take so much thought, but he smiled in an somewhat fake manner and waited. When I finnaly responded I felt as if I had either passed a test or failed two more. “i will serve because it is you who asks.” I dont know what thoughts went trough his mind then, and I will never learn but he smiled, a more genuine smile and told me to become exemplerary. This-this I understood. Far more than childhood games with sakumo, or the feeling of steel in my hands. I understood this. It was an order, a soft one, one I could fail. But I would not.there was no other choice.

The academy was strange, it wasnt what I remebrred from a hazy anime in my far youth, it was very much a military instituion designed to create sneaky special ops soldiers, and though I wasnt great at politics, or advanced meaning comprhension, I could do sneaky. Sleight of hand and snipers habbits, combined to make it clear I knew what I was doing in sabotage and stealth, but my weapons scores was where I really shined, blowing even students years ahead out of the water. I even learned how to bounce my shurikens off each other to richochet into two seperate killshots. And I always wore my katanna to class. My taijutsu was decent, because as father told me, plated gloves were also a weapon, and though I didnt have a natural aptitude for them as I did all the other weapons I have learned it was still expected to be proficent. I was small, and almost preternatually quick, fastest in my class for sure, possibly in all the years and I always went for the kill. They called me viscious and a little wolf. I was watched constantly by the zoo, the masked nin the anbu. The people I wanted to be in last life ,and perhas even in this one had not I had orders from a higher power. I know they carried reports on me to the hokage, because when it came time for the first free for all spar, with all permitted weapons and tactics he came to oversee, and took me aside before hand. It felt like the hands of fate when he looked me in my cold-grey-glass eyes and told me, “i know the hatake are training you to be a weapons mistress, I want to see it. Don't kill and don't maim, but you are permitted to do everything short of that.” there was something broken in his eyes the same way there was in mine. I nodded in confirmation and uttered out, “hai, hokage-sama, any other parameters I should be aware of?”

he smiled, and told me no.

I have a tendency to remember my fights in crystal clarity, the way I have been told the sharigan functions. This may have been the only fight in either of my lives so far where I did not remember every motion, every intent and every action. I just knew that my blade flowed like water and silk, and my kunai always landed ring first in the bulls eye, that kids years older than me hit the ground and got fingers-hands-wrists stomped on hard enough to bruise. That I moved and moved and _**moved.**_ It was supposed to be a ten minute spar. Somehow it felt like the end of the world wrapped in cotton, and It was chaos. One kid I remember from early in the academy, an uhiha blew a fireball in my face, which likely broke the rules, so I ducked under him and smashed my sandal into the side of his head in a brutal highkick. Another a taijutsu prodigy who could best me in a fair fight charged me, arms already blurring, so I scored a thin line across his stomach, enough that he knew it would have been a killing blow had I applied more force. Ninja combat is different from snipers duels, movement matters far more than accuracy ever could. Everything is about getting close, about entering the kill-zone of your weapon but not theirs, which is difficult when everybody uses the same basic weapons. And theyre small. When the smoke-dust-confusion-blood ended, and I stood there unbowed among a field of nearly broken children, the hokage had me brought to him. I feared that I had disapointed him. That I was a failure. He took one look at me, and cut me off at the knees, “good job. That was truly exceptional. Keep it up and I might have to take you under my wing.” I gasped, bowed and stammered out a hai hokage sama. He smiled. Weapons belong together.

I had an extreme ammount of trouble making friends. I was, well, a jagged thing and quite frankly an asshole compared to other kids. Not intentionally, I had been told to make friends, and suggestions are just different orders. But... It was hard in a way it wasnt in the military. I managed to be on somewhat decent terms with a sarutobi named hiruzen. He was a ninjutsu specialist in the making, and he seemed to be wise beyond his years.he had a rivalry with a kid named danzo. The problem with danzo I felt, was that in a future that might be he didnt know how to properly make and utilize his tools.shinobi are weapons, some more so than others, but the thing about weapons is they require care, and repair. Which he never gave ROOT. Didnt like danzo but I understood his insistence on a mission first mentality. He thought he was strong but really, he wasnt. We ate lunch together and practiced. It wasnt friendly practice it was the hard scrabble, bleeding kuckles wounded pride kind of sturggle that is truly necccesary to engrain the ability to fight-kill-win in someone.

On my sixth birthday my parents threw me the first birthday party I ever had. Hiruzen and Danzo attended, and it was strange. Kaa-san made mochi, I was given gifts of shuriken and kunai but the thing that stood out to me the most was the new clothes. I was not a vain child, I still hadnt even seen my face at this point, and I exclusively wore exercise rated training clothes so getting a new outfit was, truly bizare. I remember looking up at tou-san and asking in a flat voice, “what?” and he told me that since I was officially the clan heir, t was time for certain things. The free for all had proven to the rest of the clan that I wasnt jus a strong contendor but the only contendor. I unraveled the package and pulled out a yukata that went to mid thigh, black shinobi pants, a pair of black sandals, and a mesh armor shirt that would cover my arms where the three quarts sleeves of the yukata ended. There was a pair of black gloves, with a metal plate on the back of the hand for catching blades. It was engraved with the leaf of konoha. I think I hugged him then, which shocked me. He patted and tousled my hair while my friends snickered, and then he dropped an even greater bomb on me. “im having you sign the summoning contract tommorrow and thats when you'll get your last gift.” I was... shellshocked, my instincts screaming about a new pack, new hunting parthenrs, new new important. He smiled a wolves smile and I returned it. Hatake teeth are sharper than normal except for our canines which far more resemble the wolves with which we have been aligned since the days of the sage.

Sleep that night didnt come easy, but I eventually fell into dreams of hunts and blood, and I dont know if that was normal for my brother.

Summoning contracts are sacred things. They change you, blood body and soul, because you bind in the truest medium yourself to another power for power life for life, and in some cases death for death. Summons choose, they choose their summoner, they chose how to serve, and they chose when to not. To be chosen for a contract, let alone a noble contract like the wolf contract, is, no small feat. Often earned torugh bravery and blood, and sometimes kindness, sometimes cruelty. The wolves favor efficency. They are pack hunters, they work together to wreak havoc on greater prey and rival packs. To be a wolf is to kill quickly, efficently and move on, only coming back to share the spoils with the pack. As such wolves will not align with one who is pointlessly cruel or acts without reason. I was somewhat worried that I would not be chosen, because I was appointed to deal death by the shinigami herself, but it was the fith wolf who chose me. And me alone. The wolf was young, the size of a normal wolf still, but she would grow, I could feel it in her, and she could too. Bone white, save for a brown patch over her right eye, eyes like artic ice. She stalked around me, sniffing me, and asked for the alpha was not here, “child, you smell of death, but not of cruelty. Why do you smell so strongly of it?”

“death chose me before my birth, to carry the final truth and to fight in her name. How does it smell? I have never noticed it, and neither have the inuzuka.”

“like paper and tombs and blood, are you blooded yet?”

“not in this life no. will you work with me?”

“i look forward too it, as parthners.”

“as parthners. What may I call you?”

“you may call me aiko”

when we finished circling each other father appeared from the trees and present me a wrapped package, I unraveled it and found a naginata sized for a full grown woman, and though I was gorwing into my height fast, I was still short of five feet tall. The blade was bone white, hatake white.

“for you , we start training with it tonight. War looms, and you are too small to use a closer range weapon yet.”

“hai, tou-chan.”

“oh? Im tou-chan now?”

“yes, yes you are,” I mumbled as I wrapped him in a hug, for only the second time in my life. In pat to cling to him for this uncomparable gift, and in part because I was overwhelmed by the barrage on my sense. Hearing and smell were far sharper now. His heartbeat was slow and steady, and he smelled like blood-steel-leaves-alpha which meant safety. He picked me up and carried me slowly back to the clan housing as aiko trotted along by our side.

I think I loved the naginata more than any other weapon, it was so versatile. I could strike with the butt, slash with the blade, even thrust, though tou-chan told me not to rely on thrusting while the weapon was too big for me to fully utilize. My speed was adjusted and weight were applied in addtion to my weapon. My arms were like lead every night as I curled into sakumos side. I grew faster and more sure everyday, and me and aiko worked side by side. Halfway trough my final year tou-chan gave me my war plate it was very ceremonial.

The clan had gathered at the training field, and I came in my best outfit, my birthday yukata over mesh, and black pants and bandages and sandals, gloves shined. And knelet before my clan-head, and was ritually garbed in my first warplate. It was a single dou, over a leather vest, and it had a fur mantle like I had often stroked on my fathers one in the armory. It was small, but then so was I. The clan lined up, and I quickly got a crash course in fighting armored. I left that field bruised and battered but uncut.

Slowly I was gifted the next pieces of my light-warplate. Guantlets that left my fingers free for ninjutsu, and greaves that go over my bandaged pants legs to add weight to my kicks. I was told to wear my armor and weapons consistently, which I took to mean constantly. I quickly grew used to the weight, and it was... comforting.

Ninjutsu training sucks. Its mainly meditation which I could do, and manipulating the buzzing energy beneath the skin. And while I could fight on trees and water, converting that buzzing energy to outward electricty was tough. Handsigns seemed.... useless when pratice alone was needed to manipulate it. So I praticed direct manipulation, and soon I could spit a lightning bolt, and channel electricity to sharpen my naginata to the point of slicing trough stone. Coating my limbs in a crackly shield so I could slide my hands inside of targets when my naginata was lost, or it came to tai jutsu was something I was working on still when I graduated.

At seven I was graduating the academy, and I looked at myself in a mirror for the first time in my entire life, and wasnt pleased entirely with what I saw. The dysphoria of having a new, too small too weak body hadn't really sunk in until just then. I knew I looked different, that I was a hatake now. I knew that but it still hit me life an explosive tag. Its one thing to know your different, its another to see it. My hair was silver, and long held in a tradtional braid down to the small of my back. I couldnt remember ever having had a haircut in this life. My eyes were charcoal grey with something jagged in them, and my mouth had fangs. And I just... I didnt like it. Or I thought I could like it, in time. But not yet. But I , I could do something about the hair. So I undid my braid,and pulled out one of my kunai, and hack away the hair at chin length, and then hacked away the right side. Until I had a decent side-shave. It felt, right. This was the way I wore my hair for most of my first life. And it... it helped. So there I was in full battle dress, greaves and cuirass mantle and guantlets and gloves onver yukata and mesh with a pile of hair and an unmasked face and it just. It must have looked piteious. So I pulled on my mask, it was a simple medical style mask, made of cloth, and emblazoned with a wolves snarl, at my request. And now now I looked something approaching proper. The smells died down a decent bit then too and it was... better. I felt just a little bit more like myself. Kachan threw a fit about the hair cut though. I wouldn't let her alter it. This was... right. It was all right now. I was more myself than I had been in.. quite awhile. The clan was in a bit of a minor uproar for a bit, breaking tradtion and all... but I didnt care. I was heir and I could do anything I was strong enough to do.


	6. Interlude 1-Tobirama POV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> weapons belong together, and wheels turn

the first time tobiroma met the child who would become Ren of the filled graves, it was as liege lord overlooking his new recruits. Tobirama would be the first to admit that he had difficulties as a person, and seeing others as people and not battlefield obstacles was one of them. Before hashirama had died he had been making progress, but his eyes were still cold, and calculating and dead. But seeing the young hatake clan heir, to see those eyes on an unblooded child, he knew then that whatever else may happen, he must keep an eye on her. Potiental or not a person broken the way they were needed certain things. Orders, purpose, a watchful eye. He would give those, but the watchful eye first, as this child was likely to become excedingly dangerous. In years he would come to know how true that was, as even at the young age of five ren of the filled graves, wore a sword and armor like she had been born into it. In a way perhaps she had.

After his speech, morale is important to keep up, he asked each and every academy recruit why they wished to be a ninja. Most had idealistic answers, or ones that saddened him, but only hatake ren's surprised him, for she had looked at him with eyes filled with a sudden sense of purpose, and whatever answer she had prepared, for she had prepared one he did not doubt, was ignored. “i will serve because it you who asks.” the sheer... loyalty in that surprised him. Though looking back on it tobirama supposes that the instincts of wild clans know who is in charge the moment they appear, and they follow the hierachy rigidly. Even trough that lense, the sudden, intense loyalty meant only one thing. Ren thought they were kindred souls.perhaps that tobirama would never give an order that ren couldnt follow.

When ren came close to graduation, shooting up like a reed, unbeaten and unbowed in any combat the academy could give, began wandering everyday in warplate, tobirama was becoming increasingly certain he needed to keep an eye on her permanetly. It seemed it was time to take on genin.


	7. Serving the liege

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a name , and a course of action, a tool is utilized

here is a thing about loyalty and pack. You just know to whom you should kneel. It is not a matter of power, or protection, or even of mortal authority. It just is. In my past life I had met men far more wrathful and terrifying than tobirama was on an average day and yet I did not submit to them. But lord tobirama had that ephemeral quality that screamed leader. Loyalty was a given, especially since he took an interest in me. Lord second was not a man to make idle investments, and we had the same thing behind our eyes. When our genin team was brought before lord tobirama, and set to our first tasks of the day, he asked us a question before we could begin researching fuin, for this was a strength he wished to pass onto the village, and we were his. The question was simple, direct, and somewhat insightful. “if you are surrounded by enemy nin, with no way out, what do you do in the time given to you.” hiruzen replied, “try to bluff my way out.” danzo said, “commit suicide that I will not be made to spill village secrets” I sat there, on that training round sheets with malformed caligraphy on them as my lords gaze fell upoun me, and I replied even as my brush moved. “ I would kill my way out. In such a scenario the only way out is trough.”

lord tobirama ruffled my hair, in wha was a surpising gesture, for me at least, and said, “ and this is why in combat sceanrios, ren will lead. You are the vanguard of a frontline squad ren, when war comes, and it will it will be your role to break trough enemy lines even at the cost of your own life”

“but hokage-same, I wont die. I have too many things to do to die.”

he luaghed at that.

It turns out I had no innate talent for fuinjutsu. At all. My mistakes were often and explosive, and so lord tobirama tuaght me how to manipulate the earth that I could toss my failed experiments in a hole before they could harm me. And this gave me an idea. We had had many lessons, on image, reputation and how sometimes the sharpest blades are the ones your enemies give you. So I asked a simple question, “why not leave a filled grave at every battle I partake in? That way I can guide my reputation.they can count their dead and know it was me, and thus they will be more apt to turn and run.” it was approved on a trial basis.

Heres the thing about elements. The primary affinty will always be the most powerful. For me like most hatake that was lightening.lightning is often considered to be the most dangerous affinty to train, and you dont learn it without lichtenberg scars. And sometimes a stopped heart. Mine was stopped three times, by the the point I got it. It didnt stay stopped so I avoided the post death consequences.

But above all else what lighning is at its core is speed. Speed so fast it superheats the air. That it burns, and moves in miliseconds. And speed generates force. I could theoretically rip out a heart with a hand wreathed in lighning without needing the full chidori, although the full chidori had been calculated to contain enough force to demolish city blocks. The earth on the other hand is grounded, unmoving stillness. It is a wall, it is the floor, and it is the point inbetween. Despite earth being funamentally different than lightening, I found that it was simplier to me, as I had my snipers training still, and even now as a frontline shinobi I was a weird mix between the two.

One of the many things about serving lord second directly was that he could not take low ranked missions, even to teach us, and so where other genin cut their teet on poorl armed bandits we did so on shinobi. Our first battle was.... dispointing.

It was a standard ambush of iwa nin crossing the border via ame, and it went off almost suspiciously flawlessly. We wanted to be somewhat quiet about it, and leave a survivor. So when they entered our killbox, they fell into my pit trap, and were suddenly under assualt by a relentless barrage of shuriken via my hands. The movement was all n the wrist flick flick flick.the fight was like shooting fish in a barrel, and then I ran ut of shuriken which meant it was time for stage two, an so I dropped into the pit, lightning wreathing my right hand, screaming like birds, a proto chidori, lacking the force of the finished version which I would leave to my future nephew. It is a strange thing to force your way trough armor and bone, its a powerfully heady feeling. The flesh around my hand was like putty as I cluched down onhis heart and yanked. It came out in a shower of singed blood, and I turned my eyes upoun the remaining iwa nin. I held out the heart in my hand, and in my most innocent voice asked, “did he need this mister?” and then I couldnt help it but I started luaghing. “Sorry, sorry I couldn't help myself. Why are you in fire country?”

he spilled his guts when lord hokage appeared. He conspiciously called me by my first name as he tured the last iwa nin free.

I served two years, as tensions built by the knee of lord hokage. And managed to get myself a c-rank bounty and a name. Ren of the Filled Graves, it made me, giddy to think about it. Of course it locked me into a patter of behavior, namely taking time post fights to bury my opponents in open graves, which if I werent totally and utterly cheating via the grace of the shinigami, I would often not have the chakra for it. I had become lord tobirama's problem solver. The sword that was held over the neck of enemies and traitors alike. It took some talking but I managed to talk lord tobirama into letting the uchiha into the general forces, and to better integrate them into the village. It was essential for our strength to be arrayed in full as we entered a war footing. Only once was I sent in village to do lord tobirama's will. The head of the hyuga mainhouse, had finally stepped over the lines in the sand, and his treatment of the branchouse could no longer stand. And so I was sent, and told to make a message of it. I met the clan head, and his council for tea, and did as instructed.

“lord tobirama, finds your treatment of his shinobi to be appaling. He has sent me to mediate a solution.”

“the only reason the senju devil would send you is to fill more graves. Have you not done enough child?”

“a peaceful resolution is prefered, but my orders give me leeway. Please do not make me force this issue.”

and he stood up, byakugan flaring. And he fell down, as dead as anything beneath the moon. His heart beating feebly in my hand, as I turned twoards his elder council.

“please, reliquish control of your branch house, or I will be forced to make even more of an example.”

they refused to, one of them going so far as to attempt to activate the caged bird seal, so I hit him in the hand with a kunai, before reacing to the storage seal tatooed on my wrist and pulling my naginata. There were four elders in the room, and each one would kill me with a touch, so as I flashstepped behind the first one and rammed the blade trough his chest, using the sheer momentum to spin into a high kick to the head of the nect one, a viscious roundhouse that dashed his head against the walls, I resolved that they just wouldnt touch me. From there, it was simple,they were too old to use the kaiten, and I was too smart to throw weapons indoors, so my katana came out of the seal, and from that point everything got a little jumbled. And then it ended, and I stood alone in a pile of limbs of blood splatter. Evidently they had died hard. I could respect that.

When I reported in lord tobirama, was not entirely pleased, because he had truly wanted a peaceful solution. I told him of the clear threat displayed, and the refusal to listen to reason. He told me that despite how hard his job would be fore the near future, now that the village knew that he would use force things would come more in line. I was just happy to serve, as I informed him.


	8. The war in Ame

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the vanguard strikes, things happen, and kumo finds itself shocked

I was sent to ame, when war broke out. I was thirteen, and going to war for the second time. I'll be honest, I was terrified. Sakumo and I had drifted apart do to my role, and we were to be deployed to different fronts. My pack was going alone to fight because he no longer desired to be around me. And I couldnt even blame him. Before he left for the suna front I pulled him into a bone creaking hug and told him to stay safe.

When the vanguard left for ame, it was not a happy occasion. We reviewed what we knew, knowing full well that kumo was already there. We would begin our war with assualting entrenched postions under heavy rain, against a predomaintly lighting using army. Losses were going to be....bad. There were better than decent odds this is where I would die for the first time. But I marched to war alongside my comrades, all of us armed to the nines. Warplate, and raincloaks, pre-eqiuped because we just wouldnt have time when we got there. Our hitai-ates were worn on our right arms, buffed and shined, in the brutal melee that is assualting entrenched postions with a primary weapon thats fucking knives, that will be the only chance we get to know who not to gut. We all wore our weapons, a full assualt loadout. Kunia wrapped in explosive taggeds, tone and all, shuriken sharpened and dipped in viscious paralytics. Tantos and wakizahis were common to be seen on waists, and a few katannas hung off backs. There were a few others with naginatas like me, and a few with bo's. We were the first battalion, and we ran to war beneath the light of fire countries winter sun.

our target was the outermost defensive line, a civilian village which had been taen by kumo, and hanzo didnt care to retrieve as long as no one encroached on his citadel, the industrial heart of ame, and most neighboring nations. Most kunai were built there, truth be told, and it choked the skies with smog. The approach was... not silent, we couldnt afford that. We needed to establish and hold the beach head. And so as we left the tree line surrounding the village it was with leaps into the air and a rain of explosions. The ground shook, and the kumo nin lit the sky with cold thunder. I watched-felt as my comrades, my temporary pack fell like birds taken from the wing. My arm moved in a blur, up, down, up, down, up , down. Only stopping when my kunai pouch ran dry, so my left arm blurred, as I hit the groun on cats feet. Rushing forward behind a line of shuriken, I prepared myself, slamming to a stop, mud splashing up against my torso, and I flew trough handsigns, and breathed. A ear shattering bolt of ligtning, a beam of pure electricity streaked from me, and I turned my head guiding it gently, as I chewed apart the first defensive line. A kunai hit me then, slamming trough my plate, meaning the person who threw it was monstrously strong.

I closed to closer range, kunai and shuriken slamming into me, dodging lightning by seconds-miliseconds-not enough, as I hit my knees, my hair frizzing and smoking as it stands on end. A large scorch mark on my chest and my plate bubbling where it had been melted , and I forced myself to my feet, staggering from the loss of balance, I finally reached their trenches, my naginata arcing in to take a head, spinning I slammed out with its iron capped but, cracking ribs, and moving forwards. Slash, block with the shaft, move, move, slash, block, hack. It was a near constant spray of blood and limbs flailing in and out of sight, and I channeled my lightning down my blade. It screamed like birds on the wing and cut cut cut like a lightsaber trough anything. Another lighning bolt pounded into me at close range and I hit the mud,my naginata sticking out of the chest of a swordsmen,i pushed myself up, katanna flashing, and stepped into the fangs. Ligaments, and tendons, as I flash stepped from target to target to target, veins and organs, and lightning and it …. wasnt enough.

The vanguard was dying around me, and they were my responsibility because I was the alpha here, and I was failing , and I howled. It was a long warbling war cry. The hatake in the vanguard returned the cry, and the inuzuka did as well, and then what had been a series of disparate skirmishes was pulled back into a spear head, and I lead a thresher trough the village. It becomes even more blurry here, I just remember taking heads with my left hand until my sword ended up in a building, and the my tanto was flashing out for intestines, for fingers, and my right hand was wreathed in lightning, as I stepped forward and ripped. And then... I fell, kunai in all my limbs, my weapons empty and missing, hands cracking and spitting, being slammed with senbon and shuriken as all I could do was glare at them. A lightning wolf was formed, and like that the tip of the spear was blunted, because I fell fell fell.

It seared like liquid fire, and ached like ice and it hurt in an indesribalebe way. And I knew it wouldnt end.

I blinked, when I found myself in the final garden, sitting across from death in her more human guise.

“how have you been ren? Youve been doing a very good job, and im very proud of your work so far.”

“i... I dont know? I have served lord tobirama well, but my relationships with my brother are... gone? And im failing my men, and I just died again. I, I dont know.”

“its okay not to know, ill see you shortly.”

and I came back into life luaghing like a hyena, a mad high cackle that echoed even over the chaos of the battlefield, and I stepped up, up up, and breathed, as my hands flashed. And I brought down the thunder. It was a rolling branching chainlightning that streaked trhrough the kumo nin, and they hit the ground screaming. Leaf nin were kept relatively safe as bolt after bolt after bolt flashed down, and turned the village into a bombed out ruin. and I hit the ground, sinking back to my knees.

There was blackness then, and I was cold, wand wet, and so so tired. And then I felt a hand pull me roughly to my feet, and I blearily opened my eyes, just in time to catch my second in command flinch.

“are, are you okay ma'am? You, you dont look okay.”

“death sent me back sayuri, death sent me back? I.... im not okay. Whats our situation.”

“being handled, just, just rest ma'am, whatever you did at the end there won us the battle, and... do you have any orders?”

“ii, yeah, recover any usuable weapons and muntions, and get a doton user to make a open grave in the center of the village. We'll leave them for the beasts. We, need to move out in an hour, we have two more targets to take before nightfall, or our first push is a failure.”

“we, we found your weapons ma'am.”

“good.. thats good, please bring them too me.”

“ill.. ill do that, and ill bring you a mirror too.”

when sayuri came back with my weapons and a scavenged mirror, I made sure to sit and clean and sharpen my weapons before fitting them into their places before I even thought about using the miror.

The second time I used a mirror in this life I... did not like what I saw. Black sclera, grey irises, a crack that started under my left eye, crossed the bridge of my nose and split into two like forked lightning on my right cheek. I stared for a while, before reaching into my pouch and pulling out a bottle of pigment, and applied electric blue paint under my eyes, like eye-liner, and sealed it into place with chakra, it made a image to be sure. An odd mix between existenially horrofying and nice color cordination. But this was... well. Death had told me this would happen. That... didnt make it bearable, but I had learnt to deal with the issues this body sometimes cuased me, and this would be no different. So I stood up, slipped the mirror into my pouch, and howled. The hatake, and inuzukas howled back, and the remaining members of my vanguard battalion howled back, albeit a bit more hesitantly.

And then, I summomed aiko, and leaned against her as I spoke to my men, my women, my soldiers, “today is a good day! We have taken our first objective, but we do not have time to rest on our luarels. By dusk we will have penetrated a hundred miles into the heart of ame! Our losses have been rough, but we are well up to fighting strength! The wounded may choose to stay here and fortify our gains, as our comrades will arrive in a days time. Move out! If you have summons, call the mnow, our next battle is likely to be even rougher as they know weve come.”

assualting the second postion, with more limited muntions was... far harder, so I called the thunder first, and then our summons blitzed into the village with konoha nin on their tails. The battle was cacoupahnous. I turned to sayuri, and prompted by something I couldnt quite name, asked a single question, “do you think the sky weeps for the ninja?” sayuri fired an arrow, and asnwered me, “the very earth weeps for us, why should the sky be any different.”

the third village was... we couldnt take the third village before dusk, so I sent aiko to inform lord tobirama of the delay.

That night we counted our kunai and shuriken and senbon, in all the variants we had looted. There.. werent enough, so I decided on a plan. I called the leaders of the vanguard and told them we were doing a close range night assualt. We would have no bombardment, and ranged battles were to be kept to a minimum. Under the cover of night we were going to break trough and do battle blade to blade. We simply didnt have the resources for anything else. Most of our chakras were at half or lower,and we couldnt sustain anything more.

There were a lot of throats slit that night, underneath the weaping sky. We came upoun them like a sledgehammer.... I honestly felt bad for them... or I did until one of them took my left arm off with a chokuto, so I spun my naginata in my right hand as my left reformed, and took out his throat.

That night , as we sat in an enemies used fortifications stories were swapped over fire, and drinks were passed around, and I sat with aiko and pondered. I... I wasnt sure how I felt about this war in ame. I wanted to be with sakumo, on the suna front. It was less likely to remind me of my first death I think, and I could protect my pack then. But I had lord tobiramas favor, and I was determined not to let him down. I over heard a joke, being passed around the campfires that night, and it remains funny to me in a morbid way,:whats the only thing more shocking than a group of kumo nin-

-ren of the filled graves

it was funny because it was terrible. I lied against aiko, staring into the rain, and for the first time in this life I cried. There was... no point in this war. Lord tobirama, only went to war to curb a threat from outside that was testing our borders, but kumo didnt want anything as far as intelligence could tell. And then suna joined kumo, due to their treaty. At least iwa and kiri were staying put for now. They were... not quiet sobs, but the rain drowned out my noise, and my eyes couldnt get puffy anymore.it was... it was terrible. I couldnt stand it. Once again this body felt foreign, and I... I would get used to it. There was nothing else to do.

Dawn came with a messenger hawk from lord tobirama, giving us our new orders. There was... to be a withdrawal so the first battalion could recuperate while the second battalion fortified our holdings so far. We had driven a spike into enemy lines, and now we were pulling back. Camp can be pulled up sirpsingly quick when the risk of enemy nin is high. The run back trough the rain and the mud was brutal, and even if my chakra was now unlimited if I remebered what death had told me correctly I still grew fatigued. I was not looking forward to speaking with lord tobirama about this.... it was likely to be unpleasent.


	9. War in ame 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> more war yay,some introspection

my debrief with lord tobirama was not in fact, pleasant. It was very anxiety inducing actually. Especially when lord tobirama got stuck on the fact that I looked like an edo tensaid version of myself. A version who was five years older than I should have been. I was afterall only thirteen in this life. We eventually managed to figure that it was because edo tensai ressurects at the hypothetical prime. This made sense to me, even if lord tobirama kept muttering about how using yourself as the sacrifice for your own edo tensai is just ridiculous. I respectfully informed him that the shinigami could do whatever they wanted and we kinda just had to go along with it. My death, and my tattered armor, and the fact that none of it fit properly now, meant I had to go back to konoha and resupply, and then return to the war effort. I was vocally displeased to be sent away from the front where my battalion was even now preparing for another push. Lord tobirama insisted that I had to go tell my parents myself, and get new armor. I was afterall the clan heir, and my gear is designed to reflect that. I, did not have anything I could really say to that.

Konoha was unchanged, and so was the clan compound. Mother and father wept when they saw me, and they yelled when my explanation was done. It was.... unpleasent.luckily the hatake clan had prefabbed armor for my projected growth spurts, unfortuneatly no one had really expected that by the time I reached eighteen I would be six and half feet tall. So only the dou would fit, well that and my previous fur mantle, though it was now more of a collar than a mantle. Either way I would not give it up. Resemblence to lord tobirama or no.my weapons were still approiately sized so that was fine.

I spent two days in the compoun in the calming presence of my pack, as I relearnt my new balance with all my weapons. When I was satisifed I summoned aiko, and we returned to the ame front. Lord tobirama had held the lines, but I was a now quasi-immortal weapons master. A wrecking machine. So lord tobirama took one look at my more limited armor, and nodded his head, as I slid on my rain cloak and attached my hitai-ate to my sleeve once more.

That night four more villages burnt under the thunder-gods wroth, and kumo nin fled like mice before the cat. I led personally from the front for 30 straight hours while my soldiers took turns in assualt and defense groups. When the last of kumo had been pushed from their defensive postions my battalion returned to lord tobirama, dripping blood and rain and reported a total route. That night iwa declared war on us and in the ddawns light , at our fortieth hour of consciousness the earth itself became our enemy as explosions rammed down around us. And so we returned fire, with any throwing weapon we could find, and a few who had scavaenged archery supplies used those as well. A long distance battle, where only one side could use jutsu wasnt fair. So I evened the playing field, and lightning streaked forth. From my mouth, thrown by my hands as if a javelin, shaped into hunting hounds and unleasehed. There was many things I tried that day, but as I looked into the man wearing a iwa junin uniform, and felt his heart flutter in my grip... I knew that there was two things I would be famous for in the end. Open graves, and torn out hearts. This actually made me rather sad. Id rather be known for the naginata. Which I was using in my left hand to deflect kunai and take limbs as my right took hearts.

When that battle ended and the sun burnt down on a field of corpses, I reflected on the simple fact that I was a monster.i had been in my past life, and I was now. Surely no one normal could do the things I did without flinching? Perhaps death has eternal need of monsters and I was simply closest. I did not know. It was the not knowing that made me uncomfortable really. I was a weapon, forged from birth, made to kill, but I didnt like to think of myself as a monster. I imagine most don't.


	10. a mask, a gift, and a deployment to a different front

a thing ive noticed in the years since the second war was that no one really talks about how bad ame was. They say it was the worst front, that it forced laws of warfare onto the nations by sheer existence but that doesnt really cover what we did there. hanzo posioned the air and the water till to even come within a thousand miles of his citadel without a repsirator was to court death. Kunai fell like rain so heavy it blotted out what little sun was left. Often we had to advance using the corpses of our friends as makeshift shields. Every one of us burried a number of friends. Sakumo came in for a single deployment in ame, and even though he had stained suna's sands almost as red as sasori eventually would he blanched at what was happening in ame. Every night there was a raging fire in some village in that no mans land. kill squads hunted down wounded shinobi and enemy sympathizers within our conquered territory. Civilians were targeted with disturbing regularity. Even when I tried to stem to the tide. I took to wearing a rope wrapped around my waist in case I needed to hang any hunter-killer nin for attacking civi's which was the only crime that lord tobirama told us not to commit. Rivers were so choked with bodies that you could walk across without getting wet. Well, wetter than the rain would make you. Summons fought like maddedned base beasts, and the very air reeked of despair. Even in my past life, nothing trully matched up with what happened in ame. By the time all sides were putting up desecrated corpses as warnings and mining civilian villages as lines of defense, hanzo himself decided to sorty out. I met him in battle thrice, two of those times besides the sannin, hiruzens students as they carved their legend torugh their survivial much as I had carved mine trough carnage.

I will admit that of his students I only liked orchimaru. When the ame orphans were found and I was with them, he told his friends it would be a kindness to kill them. I agreed. Jirayia said he would train them, that he would protect them, and thats when I broke in.

“no. you won't. There is a war on jirayia. And I am the commader for this front. Give them some rations and a raincoat, but we cannot afford to lose you for the years you would need to get them up to snuff.”

“its the right thing to do!”

“that doesnt matter. You have a duty jirayia.”

and that was that. As the kids took the rations and turned to run, I knelt beside them, my mask scaring them as no matter how brave a war oprhan they were they were ame war orphans, and my mask was almost more famous than me. I took off my kunai pouch and handed it to them, and they nodded, knowing this was the only kindness I could show them. When I turnt back to the young sannin jirayia and tsunade were telling orichmaru that he couldnt just tell people to kill kids. I cut in again,

“he was right. And weve all killed our share of genin out here. Theres not much of a difference between a genin and a war oprhan. Not in ame.”

and that was that.

The rain, which always stank of toxins and blood drenched you so heavily that you could feel the slickness around your very bones. If you looked up at the sky you were liable to drown. It was on the only sunny day I had ever seen in ame that the first battalion was finally redployed. Keeping a unit in the field for two years was not done generally, but without someone like me, or the newly minted sannin to hold the lines, there wouldnt be a konoha front in ame anymore. And so I was sent to iwa, naginata in hand, rope swinging from my waist in the new flak vest designed by tobirama, combat capirs, my standard mesh underamror a turtleneck, and plated gloves. This would become my iconic standard uniform over the years. Even though I greatly preffered the warplate, standard uniforms had to be observed during wartime. And alternat uniforms were for clan heads, not clan heirs. I was more than a bit bitter about that.

Iwa was, the polar opposite of ame. It was rocks, and earth, and no rain, no green. The air was almost painfully clear, and for the first time since I was eleven going on twelve I didnt need to wear my mask. So I took it off. The air here was offensively clear, no scents on it.iwa's explosion corps had been brutally devasted in their own push into ame. And I had personally carved my way trough their jounin corps. So we were just here to pressure them into an official surrender. Then I could be deployed to suna, or for the final push into kumo. Kiri was a tentative ally now, having stayed out of it in the early war.

We met with the tsuchikage on the field, the man was amaster of the dust release, but he had no army, and though he could decimate ours, there was no real point. We negoitated a cease fire, with potiental to becomea truce at the end of all hostilities in this war. He handed me a gift as the iwa tradtion dictated, a pair of dao blades.

I practiced with them on the way to suna, whenever we stopped. I was a vertiable walking armory at this point, all three of my tradionall blades were threaded trough my rope-belt, my kunai pounches on my thighs, the dao blades crosses on my back and the naginata in my hands. There were kucke-deuster-kives in my sandals, and senbon hidden in my sleeves.


	11. Apologies

The word document holding this story got corrupted and i couldn't restore it. I'm sorry but this story is discontinued now. ill start another story or two so don't worry too much, but i am sorry i couldn't bring this one to a good conclusion


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